Kinked (Elder Races, #6)(54)

He knelt beside her and looked at the occupant in the cradle. Quentin’s face was still clenched as he fought with his emotions. In a barely audible voice, he said, “I want Amras Gaeleval alive again so I can hurt him. A lot.”

She put a hand on his shoulder, gripping him tightly. His muscles were rigid. “Now you sound like me.”

He glanced at her, pain pooling in his eyes. Then in a gesture that seemed as natural as breathing, he took hold of her hand and leaned his forehead against it.

Had she really reached out to him, and had he really accepted it?

Wonders never ceased.

She looked at his bowed head and slumped, broad shoulders. This wasn’t fun pain. This was the bad kind of pain, and nothing about it was like brandy and chocolate. This was more like taking a knife to the gut and then watching yourself bleed out.

Something welled deep inside. She supposed it was compassion. Or maybe empathy. Whatever it was, it moved her to set the frog on the floor and reach out with her free hand to stroke Quentin’s soft, dark gold hair.

He looked at her over their clasped hands, a raw, direct look. When she met his gaze it was with a shock of connection that shifted something important inside.

Then he squeezed her fingers and let her go. “I can seal the door,” he said. “If there’s anyone with magic sense in the area, that’ll pretty much tell them we’re here.”

“If it leaves him protected, so be it,” she said. “Besides, I know we chose to be wary but I’m no good at *footing around.”

A ghost of a smile played over his firm, well-cut lips. “I’m glad you saw fit to tell me, because otherwise I never would have known.”

It didn’t feel right to punch him in that room, so instead she shoved him lightly, enough to rock him but not enough to knock him over. She rose to her feet. “Do what you’ve got to do. How long will it take?”

“Five minutes.” He picked up the gold frog and set it carefully back into place with the other two figurines, then stood too.

They were quite lovely, exquisitely shaped and detailed, down to the folds in the frog’s eyes. If the set were kept together, on Earth it would fetch a fortune, especially with today’s gold prices.

She paused and cocked her head. “So we have one or maybe two people who came into Numenlaur,” she said softly. “And they are not here to loot for treasure.”

Quentin swiveled to face her, his gaze keen. “Because the figurines are still here.”

“Along with the jewelry in the first few houses we went through,” she told him. “I didn’t look at them closely, but I remember seeing some serious sparkle.”

“Which begs the question,” he said. “Why did they come here?”

“Come on.” She slapped him on the shoulder. “Do your thing so we can get out of here. It’s time we hit the city.”

He nodded, and she left him to go through the pantry supplies. They had hit pay dirt with this house. There were several wafers of wayfarer bread, along with cured meat, jerky, nuts, and dried fruit. She took everything they could carry and, chewing on a strip of jerky, she knelt outside to tuck the new supplies in their packs while the Power from Quentin’s spell built in a slow flare that snapped and disappeared, like a rubber band settling into place.

Her head lifted, and she looked around, assessing the surrounding landscape that seemed so quiet, as if she and Quentin truly were the only ones around.

Maybe one of the Elves in the missing party was a magic user and could sense what Quentin had just done. If they were still alive. Or maybe they had just attracted the attention of the trespassers, and maybe those trespassers weren’t friendly.

If so, bring ’em on. After discovering the tragedy in the house, shedding tears and suffering through pangs of empathy, she was in the mood for a little gratuitous violence.


They walked the rest of the way to the coast, both eating jerky. The sun beat down on their heads from a cloudless sky as the afternoon turned sweltering. Then a breeze picked up, blowing off the water and bringing a welcome respite from the heat.

Aryal didn’t want to look at Quentin, and she was glad he didn’t seem to be in the mood to talk. She didn’t have to glance at him to know how he walked, moving his long, muscled body with that smooth, boneless grace of his that ate away the miles like a sleek Porsche purring down a road. She could do with not seeing him at all for a couple of months, but for the moment that option wasn’t in the cards.

Her fingers kept remembering the silken glide of his short hair as she stroked him, the feeling of his forehead pressed to the back of her hand as he gripped her. The way he had come running when she had burst out of the house, his expression sharp with concern. His hand, rubbing her back. The raw emotion in his face as he stared at the tiny occupant of that exquisitely carved cradle.

She was in real trouble, all right.

She was in imminent danger of believing Quentin Caeravorn might actually be a decent man after all. Or at least part of him was, the essential part, the part that could be counted on to do the right thing when push came to shove.

Hrmph. She would rather be caught dead before she admitted that to anyone back in New York. It would completely trash whatever reputation she had. With everybody. She was quite sure right now that some of them didn’t expect both her and Quentin to return in one piece.

And well, as far as that went, it was early days yet.